Huawei P10 Plus – A Photographer’s Journey Companion

Singapore, 25 July 2017 – The Huawei P10 Plus smartphone is outfitted with Leica-designed optical technology to make it an indispensable companion for serious photographers. I attended a workshop hosted by professional photographer Richard Chen to find out how the Huawei P10 Plus has enriched his journey as a photographer, despite having a career in Fashion Photography that spans more than a decade.

The P10 Plus has a contoured glass and metal chassis that nestles in my hand as comfortably as the iPhone 7 Plus. Its screen resolution is a razor sharp 2560 x 1440 and crammed with a pixel density of 540 PPI – comparable to the screen resolution of the new Samsung Galaxy S8+. Aside from the touch-sensitive home button, there are only two buttons on its side – a volume rocker and a power button.

The real looker is beneath the surface. The P10 is powered by Android 7.0 Nougat OS, 6GB of RAM, a generous 3750mAH battery and a new octa-core Kirin 960 chip. It’s internal storage is hefty at 128GB but having a microSD card slot jacks up its potential drive size by another 256GB. Very generous for avid photographers, considering that the P10 Plus could shoot 4K videos and pictures in RAW format!

And this is where the P10 Plus really shines. We were asked to blind-compare fashion shoots taken with the P10 Plus and a Medium Format camera, and in most cases, we couldn’t identify which is taken with the smartphone. A testament to the detail-capturing abilities of the P10 Plus’ Leica lens. But there’s more.

The Leica Dual-Camera system is a combined effort involving a 20MP Monochrome and 12MP Colour Sensor with a wide-aperture f1.8 lens able to capture breathtaking landscape shots; and even produce creamy bokeh in challenging lighting situations. It also shoots black and white pictures with smooth and detailed gradations, achieving a look closer to actual monochromatic film pictures.

A front Leica f1.9 wide-aperture lens allows in twice the amount of light compared to regular front cameras, and even expands the frame automatically if the camera detects more people. Great for radiant selfies and wefies!

What’s more amazing is that the amount of bokeh can be adjusted after taking the shot, should you want to reveal more detail in the background.

The camera system is intelligent enough to distinguish bright and dark areas of a frame, and smartly optimise the exposure in specific areas. As a result, it is possible to get detailed, evenly-exposed shots with the P10 Plus, even in extreme circumstances. Such as shooting golden-hour photos with the sun in the background!

Among others, the P10 Plus camera app hosts an interesting ‘Light Painting’ Mode, which lets you paint interesting elements into a picture using a handheld torch. Watch the video below to see how Richard uses ‘Light Painting’ to create unique works.

Richard also reveals that he now uses the P10 Plus for casual street or portrait photography instead of lugging his mirrorless cameras about. After the workshop, it’s clear to me that the P10 Plus could achieve almost as much as an older entry level DSLR, if portrait, street or landscape photography is your thing.

The Huawei P10 Plus retails in stores for S$998 without a plan. The Huawei P10 is also available with similar features, but smaller screen size and 64GB memory for S$798.